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Smaug The Terrible
One of the last great Fire-drakes of Middle-earth, Smaug rose to prominence by laying waste to the town of Dale and capturing theDwarf-kingdom of the Lonely Mountain (Erebor) with all of its treasure. These events occurred some 150 years before the events of The Hobbit, and Smaug was already centuries old at the time. The Hobbit recounts the tale of a party of dwarves (consisting of a few of the original residents of the Lonely Mountain and their descendants), the hobbit Bilbo Baggins, and their quest to recapture the mountain and kill the dragon. In the book, the dragon is sometimes called'Smaug the Golden' or Smaug the Magnificent. Centuries spent sleeping atop his gold hoard have caused gold and gemstones to become embedded in the skin of Smaug's underside, augmenting the already impenetrable scales that covered most of his body; but when Bilbo observes Smaug in his lair, he discovers a small bare patch, of which a thrush tellsBard the Bowman, when Smaug later attacks Bard's native town of Esgaroth; whereupon the archer kills Smaug with an arrow. Among the items in Smaug's possession are theArkenstone and a number of mithril mail shirts, one of which was given to Bilbo by Thorin Oakenshield. In The Lord of the Rings, years later, the shirt saves Bilbo's kinsman,Frodo Baggins, from various injuries. The Return of the King In Appendix A, section III, of The Return of the King under "Durin's Folk", Smaug is mentioned briefly as "the greatest of the dragons of his day". Having heard rumour of the great wealth of Erebor, he "arose and without warning came against King Thrór and descended on the mountain in flames." In this text, dragons are stated to reside in the wastes (Withered Heath) beyond the Grey Mountains, "making war on the Dwarves, and plundering their works". It can be inferred that Smaug came from this region. Unfinished Tales As stated in the tale The Quest of Erebor, Gandalf knew that Smaug could pose a serious threat if used by Sauron, then dwelling in Dol Guldur in Mirkwood; assumed that Smaug would not recognize the scent of a Hobbit; and therefore asked Bilbo to accompany the dwarves. Concept and creation Tolkien created numerous pencil sketches and two pieces of more detailed artwork portraying Smaug. The latter were a detailed ink and watercolour labelled Conversation with Smaug '' and a rough coloured pencil and ink sketch entitled ''Death of Smaug.4 While neither of these appeared in the original printing of The Hobbit due to cost constraints, both have been included in subsequent editions and Conversation with Smaug has been used extensively. Death of Smaug was used for the cover of an early UK paperback edition of The Hobbit. From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, and a prominent critic of and expert on Beowulf — on which he gave a lecture at the British Academy in 19365 and which he described as one of his "most valued sources" for The Hobbit. Many of Smaug's attributes and behaviour in The Hobbit derive directly from the unnamed "old night-scather" in Beowulf: great age; winged, fiery, and reptilian form; a stolen barrow within which he lies on his hoard; disturbance by a theft; and violent airborne revenge on the lands all about. Smaug was intimately familiar with every last item within his hoard, and instantly noticed the theft of a relatively inconsequential cup byBilbo Baggins. Tolkien writes that Smaug's rage was the kind which "is only seen when rich folk that have more than they can enjoy lose something they have long had but never before used or wanted." This theft of a cup, Smaug's knowledge of every item in the hoard, and the dragon's ensuing rampage, all echo the story of Beowulf. Tolkien may also have been inspired by the talking dragon Fafnir of the Völsunga saga. Tolkien noted that "the dragon bears as name—a pseudonym—the past tense of the primitive Germanic verb smúgan, to squeeze through a hole: a low philological jest." Smaug was depicted by Tolkien as an intelligent being capable of speech, easily pleased by flattery and fascinated by Bilbo's description of himself in riddles. This is also done in later film adaptations such as The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. He is described as having "quite an overwhelming personality" and every time his eyes flash across Bilbo's invisible form, he feels almost compelled to tell him the truth about himself because of the hypnotic power within.